Primary care is severely underinvested in the United States, especially when compared with some other high-income countries, according to a speaker at the Primary Care Collaborative annual conference, Healio reports.
During his conversation with Mark Del Monte, JD, chief executive officer and executive vice president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Paul Grundy, MD, the founding president of the Primary Care Collaborative (PCC), noted that in Denmark, for example, 21% of health care investments go into primary care, compared with about 5% in the U.S.
Because of those significant differences, “we really have our work cut out for us,” Grundy said. “In the Danish system, the primary care provider is the best paid specialist, and should be.”
The 2-day PCC conference centered around the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine’s (NASEM) report on rebuilding primary health care through five objectives: payment, accessibility, the workforce, technology and accountability.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, it has become more obvious that payment is one of the most severe shortcomings of primary care, Del Monte said. Read more.
